Negligent brothers and Puebla

I am sitting in the front of our house in the sun. I've just had a LOVELY chat with Boo who is back from India. He had limited travel stories, other than the fact he stayed in a houseboat someone got murdered in, but it was still great to hear him. We haven't spoken since Colombia, as he is almost as crap at contact as Danny, who last time we spoke asked me if I was having a nice time in Africa. 

Today I have a massive chunk of time off, so me and matt are going to a famous bookstore cafe/library to ogle books and cakes, two of my best guys. Aunty Babbitt recommended it to me, and it looks fab http://pendulo.com/ .

I have actually found a lot of excellent (and cheap) second hand bookstores here, near to our house, but it will be nice to look at some new ones, and smell their smell.  I've not done much reading recently, as with my two friends I have QUITE the social calendar. Me and Angela both read a book called 'The Gathering', by Anne Enright.  We agreed it was extraordinary (and we are both Very Clever English Lit Graduates, so...) It's tells the story of a woman who's brother has died, and charts the days leading up to the funeral. It's a well constructed (if predictable) plot, but it's her use of language that is incredible. It's that amazing and rare mix of being lyrical and unusual without making you feel thick. She writes everything in a way that is hauntingly beautiful, but you feel like she just wrote it, rather than sat trying to write with the words "hauntingly beautiful" taped across her dictionary.  It's really melancholy as well, which all the best books are. It's wonderful and I recommend it.

I am also trying to read 'Just William' in Spanish. William books are my ultimate favourites, and I thought it would be an incentive to learning a bit of Spanish.  It is not. I just get frustrated at all the hilarity I'm missing, and have a suspicion it's not very translatable anyway. William is SO English, I can't really compute the idea of him saying "wot I mean to say is that ole woman is jolly well gon' ter give it back to us" in Spanish, or it being very funny if he did. Still, I've always got the pictures.  

Today is my last day teaching for a few weeks. After a strenuous two months of working 4 hours a day, we are going on holiday. It's a hard life. The plan is to lurk about DF for a few days then head out to some of the neighbouring areas around the city. Guanajuato, which is meant to be a beautiful old town (UNESCO heritage site innit), and San Miguel de Allende, which sounds a bit boring but looks very pretty.  We are going to maybe go to Taxco, which is a silver town but not sure.  I hate looking at stuff there is no chance of you actually buying. I never understand that.  When skint people go and browse in Gucci for example, when they only have £17. What's the point? It will only end in sadness and Primark. 

The week after we are going to Oaxaxa, and then to Cancun with Angela's mam, who is coming over for a holiday. I am really looking forward to it, as I am getting a bit sick of DF. I still love it, but the commute to work is ridiculous.  Thats bad enough, but if we want to meet friends in the evening, it's like a military operation. One which usually ends in abandonment, as we slump in front of youtube watching TV dramas from the mid 90s. (Band of Gold anyone? HIYA best gritty, prostitute drama, EVER!!). When we come back, I am going to look for some work closer to the house. Less 5.30 starts, more popping home for lunch. Yes. Better. 

Last weekend I went on a small trip with the boy I'm seeing. I wasn't going to mention him, but mum says I could do with some positive PR, as apparently I come across as a "loser" in this blog. No doubt it will end in tears, being that he is from Mexico and I am from Scotland, but he's lovely and I am really enjoying spending time with him. Lest I start to remind you of Liz Jones from the Daily Mail, lets leave it at that. 

He took me to visit his cousins who live in Puebla. When we arrived I wanted to kill him, as the mum had just had a baby (three weeks old!) and was visibly exhausted. They didn't speak any English, and I was pretty anxious. However they were exceptionally warm, and I was made to feel so welcome that I had a fantastic weekend. I spanglished my way through ok, with a lot of nodding and smiling, and gurgling at the baby. Children are such an amazing thing to have when you've got nothing to say, and they provide endless opportunities for non verbal communication. They fed me some of the best food I've had on this whole trip, and were just utterly kind. I tried a thing called Chiles in Nogada http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chiles_en_nogada

Which was maybe one of the tastiest dishes I've ever had. Meat, pomegranate, chilli and cream. All the hits. 

Other than stuffing our faces, we wandered the town, which was very pretty, and went out to Cholula, which has some ancient pyramids and a really bonny church at the top of a huge hill. It was a really nice little trip, but I do feel I've reached saturation point regarding "quintessentially colonial plazas" and "unmissable churches".  I don't think I ever liked churches that much, and now I've seen 4827 I certainly don't. They are nice and peaceful, and probably lovely if you are religious, but Catholic Churches do tend to have a lot of scary pictures of hell and torture and so on, and I am a bit afraid of Satan, so they make me anxious.  The ruins were ok, but they were closed (for refurbishment maybe?) so you couldn't see them all. I gather they are really impressive in general, but they weren't at their best. I may have compared them unfavourably to the Culswick Broch a few times, but they were still interesting to see. 

We spent Sunday being stuffed with food (again), and I met more cousins and in laws, who were also very nice, except when they referred to me as the giantess. I'm not sure I translated it perfectly, but I believe that was the gist. 

Puebla is allegedly 1- 2 hours from DF, but this-as usual when it comes to lonely planet- is a lie. More like double that, so you wouldn't really be arsed to go for a day trip. 

I got back to a dental appointment where she was to check my teeth.  I was horrified to find out I need NINE fillings in total. I am genuinely embarrassed to write that down, but I am also really in a state of shock. I brush my teeth (properly) at least twice a day, and don't eat sweeties that much. I've never had a filling before and suddenly I need NINE? She had already done three so I've got another six to go. I'm slightly sceptical as she obviously gets paid per filling; but I also know its £30 a tooth here (for nice white ones made of composite) as opposed to about £200 at home. The colonial racist in me is worried she is scamming me, or possibly filling them with ground chalk and PVA, but I have decided to just go with it. 

She's halfway through now, and I have to say I really like her. She's sweet ", and she never shuts up, even when I've got cotton wool and a drill in my mouth. She has curly dark hair that falls everywhere, and her makeup is so thick that when she puts on, her white mask instantly gets a bright orange rim round it.  She puts on the radio far too loud and wears rings and bangles that get caught on my clothes and hair. I think, if I was 40, Mexican, and a dentist, there is a chance I would actually be her, so I sort of feel like she's not being a shady trickster. Rather, I think I've just committed a massive boo boo by not visiting a dentist for 3 years, and having a diet similar to that of a feral monkey. 

I have an appointment with her tomorrow, which I didn't know about and have invited people over for roast dinner; including the boy. As the general anaesthetic makes me slack jawed, weird and even more vacant than usual, I will probably have been dumped by the time you read this. 

I am going to go now, I have a couple of hours before I meet Matt and am going to put on some shorts, slather my legs in baby oil and watch more Band of Gold in the sun. Besos xxx

Nice things wot I have seen

Dental Woes and Dry Hair.

I'm sitting on the train on the way to work. The sun is rising over the mountains, and it's a crisp clear sky. I have almost forgotten that I hate my job, and mornings, so captured by the rosy fingers of dawn am I.  It's all relative, and after two weeks of ill health, I feel quite fond of the trip, mainly because I have made it without a part of my body falling off/malfunctioning, or without having to rest after a particularly daunting set of escalators.  Ill health (mild). Where to start. Well. First of all, my tooth fell out. And not in a "popping a bottle of beer at a raging party, using my white and shiny molar" way; but in an "eating some cornflakes when half your blackened, decayed fang crumbles into the milk" way. Absolutely rank. Had a complete nervous breakdown and phoned mam (error number one), who said it looked like I had "rampant gum disease", and was about to lose all my teeth. Had to hang up, lie down, and try to stop picturing self as some kind of facially caved in hag. Tried- failed and sobbed indulgently on the sofa for about three hours, before trawling the internet for dentists. After corresponding with several apparently insane dentists, and several amazing ones who cost a bazillion pesos, I ended up getting a recommendation from a student.  The following day saw me in some kind of strange ghetto, looking for a dental surgery, which turned out to disguised as a cupboard in a dirty alley, and smelled like cat litter. 

It was no better or worse than the surroundings would have suggested. He poked in my mouth with questionably clean instruments, which he wiped down on his grimy (and inappropriately named) whites, as he babbled in medical Spanish. With the use of mime and illustration, we established I did not have gum disease, and was not losing all my teeth. I did however have a "muy mal" cavity and needed either a crown or a filler. Thus followed several days of very badly translated, dental documents, tearful skypes with my dads partner (who is a dentist), and the discovery that my declining teeth were thanks (probably) to my little stint in Colombia, where I ate approximately 42 sugar mangos a day. (Sugar mangos- the same as regular mangos but SWEETER...)

I dinghied the dodgy dentist, and got myself another one. The way I acquired her is quite roundabout and also odd. The bare bones of it is Angela was seeing a Mexican boy before I came, who seemed to blame the demise of their relationship on my arrival. The one and only time I met him, he said that it was funny how misleading photos could be. I had looked like quite a nice person IN MY PHOTOS. But I WASN'T in real life. Hah. Anyway, it's his dentist. She seems good, but I'm waiting for the day when my tooth drilling is interrupted by the scorned hombre, wielding dental floss in a threatening manner. The dentist is under the illusion we are great friends and I haven't known how to tell her otherwise. Anyway, I've had some weird polly filler stuff in my tooth all week, and today find out if I can just get a filling, or if a crown is in order. Fingers crossed. 

On top of the toothache, I had some horrible stomach thing, followed by a chest infection. I was inhaling antibiotics like there was no tomorrow, and now I seem to be coming out of the dark place. Lucky for me, more lucky for Angela. Because of this, I've literally done nothing for a fortnight, except crawl from work- to bed-to work again. I have manage to obliterate me and Angela's carefully constructed budget by missing almost a week of work, and spending vast sums of money downloading music from my youth, with which to curb the anxiety of being on my own in the house for more than 17 minutes. 

I am of course exaggerating, and in amongst the falling teeth and phlegm, there have been some nice things too. 

We went to The Blue House, home of Frida Khalo and Diego Riviera. It was lovely. We accidentally went on Fridas birthday, which meant it was a bit packed- but what a beautiful house! 

The exhibition of her stuff was nice, but I believe she didn't do a huge amount of paintings, so there wasn't much there. Far better for, me was drooling over her soft furnishings. I tried to take some photos for future inspiration, but got a row from an aggressive security woman.  I will just have to try to reconstruct her dreamy kitchen from memory, if I ever become a real adult with a house. 

We also went to the national anthropology museum, which is really famous for being great and informative etc etc. I think I missed something because it almost made me weep with boredom. 

It was pretty much just pots. Hundreds of pots, with some gold, and some stuff made of sticks thrown in for good measure. Even the codexes which I was really looking forward to, looked like they were cut out from the back of an 80's Beano. And it needed a good dusting. 

I had forced Angela to go because I "love museums", so for the first hour I had to feign interest in the crockery.  After an hour or so however, my desire to sprawl in a plaza eating tacos outweighed my desire to never be wrong, and I slithered off to lie in the sun whilst Angela and Matt looked at chipped cups for another hour.

I am not saying the museum commonly held to be the best in Latin America is rubbish, just that it wasn't doing much for me. I acknowledge that my inability to read Spanish, my lack of brain power and what seems to be a general indifference to anything that isn't relating to myself, probably contributed to the disillusionment, but it wasn't that great in my opinion. Sorry Mexico. 

The most thought provoking part of the day for me (and I use the term loosely) was my time in the sun, where I was given the opportunity to ponder the Mexican propensity for PDOAs. Public Displays of Affection are a daily part of life here. I fluctuate between thinking its romantic, and wanting to cheese grate my eyeballs off. It does make me realise what a repressed nation of prudes the British are, but whether I really think that's a bad thing I'm not sure. Even the over fifties do it here; full on snogging on the subway, cheeky gropes on the bus or persistent if gentle mauling in the park. Yes, that's ageist, but I'm not saying its worse from the elderly, just weirder. Mexicans seem to think British people are cold and sexless in our interpersonal relations (except when drunk), which I can also see to be a valid assessment. All I know is I spend a lot of time feeling hot and bothered when I'm on public transport. I never know where to look. Probably the answer is not "straight at them with a bright red face and a twitching jaw", but never mind. I need to work on my nonchalant face more, something I have thought before. I am too expressive, like a massive, shocked baby. 

Yesterday we went to a craft market in San Miguel. It was great. There was a square full of art which consisted of approximately 572849 paintings of women with their breasts out, or horses. Sometimes one or the other, sometimes both. There was a rare sighting to be had of abstract vases of flowers, but these were few and far between, and generally pushed to the back to give the breasts and horses greater platform.  I laughed a lot which understandably went down quite badly. 

There was also a performance of sorts consisting of the most beautiful peerie lasses with huge tropical flowers all over their head, dancing about with big white skirts on.  Later I was forced to watch an unintentionally hilarious "sword fight", where lots of tragic middle aged men poked each other with sticks whilst wearing bee keeper masks. 

The craft market was better; loads of cakes, bonkers jewelery, skeletons covered in glitter and pictures of famous Mexicans with light bulbs and bobbles coming out their foreheads. A student told me that Mexico was where the word kitsch originated from. I'm not sure this is true (India seems a contender too), but its certainly one of the team captains. I love it. 

Angela got hilariously ripped off buying some matchboxes with pictures of Mexican wrestlers on them, the purchase of which was accompanied by my haranguing insistence that "I could make you one of those. For FREE", which seemed to delight her almost as much as it did the shopkeeper.  I bought some embroidery to give as presents back home. I've decided as I've got about three more months, I better start now so I don't get to the last week and realise I have 84 sequinned frijoles to buy.  

The "I could make that" gene seems to be strong in both of us, as our house now resembles some kind of camp, Santa's grotto, full of homemade piñatas, clay moveable skeletons and other questionable "art works", that are certainly influenced (if nothing more) by the real Mexican versions which we are too tight to pay for.  I'd be being insincere if I didn't say we've made the house rather homely though. We have a couple of pals who are boys, who just come round (to get fed usually) and wistfully gaze at all the pleasant touches, which men seem so incapable of introducing into their own homes (sorry for sweeping gender assumptions but its true). The twitching cockroaches sometimes ruin the vision of domestic bliss which is irritating, as too is the pervading odour of damp shoes. Nonetheless, we get by in a
vaguely Kirsty Aslopp-like manner.

Anyway, I had better to and do some lesson plans. Last week I had a class on physical descriptions. The workbook suggested I get the class to describe each other, which I thought was naive at best, and that I would save some of them the pain of being described accurately by nominating myself instead. I smiled modestly (with just the right hint of acceptance) when I was described as "beautiful" and "young" by one creeping sook, but was soon brought crashing to earth by a gimlet eyed youth who described me as "on the heavy side" with "dry hair". In future I am determined to bring more visual aids to class. Let them describe Bradd Pitt next time. I will know better. 

Sent my